Not Alone
by AccessBlade
Summary: Lindsay was normal other than the fact that her dad was the Tranquility Chief of Police. She had no idea that her life was going to change in ways from gaining new friends to losing one.
1. Prologue

**Okay, before you start reading this I just want you to know that this story is going to be some what dark. **

**Actually, my Genesis Leader character Alex has a dark past and personality but I haven't delved that deeply into her. But ignore that for now and let's just concentrate on this story. Oh yeah, the Genesis aren't in this and I'm bringing out some new characters for this particular fic. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers; however, the characters that you don't recognize, belong to me. **

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**Prologue**

(March 2009)

The bouquet of roses crinkled in her arms as Lindsay walked towards the far end of the lake where the forest was. Cheryl had been buried near the lake, but it was in a secluded part of a forest by a hill where hardly anyone went. The lake, after all, was public property where everyone from teenagers hanging out to families with small children came to relax during the summer season. It would be unfair to take away such a significant landmark away from the citizens of Tranquility by burying a body where a lot of people had their picnics.

But she didn't want to deny her friend's final request to be buried in one of the many places that she enjoyed coming to as a child. For the past seven years, Cheryl's life had been nothing but an agonizing nightmare; something that she managed to keep hidden ven from her. The passionate red-head known for her winning smile and golden red hair deserved at least this much, she pointed out to her father when he asked why she had to bury her best friend by the lake.

After laying the bouquet of dark red roses on top of the grass that had grown over the grave the past year, Lindsay sat down in front of the tombstone and tucked a strand of her long light brown hair behind her ear. Her hair came down past her back and required more maintenance but she didn't mind that much; it just meant she had to spend a few more minutes combing it.

Folding her legs in front of her since she was wearing a skirt, Lindsay read the epitaph written on the stone:

_Cheryl Katrina Anderson_

_March 3, 1991 - March 7, 2008_

_A friend who will continue_

_to live on in memories_

_Requiescat in pace_

The last part which was usually shortened to R.I.P. which meant 'Rest in Peace' or the more formal definition of 'May he (or she) rest in Peace'.

Cheryl had found the original latin words more romantic than the english translation and had said in an off comment to Lindsay when they were younger that she wanted the latin version, rather than the bland abbreviation of 'R.I.P.' written on her tombstone when she died.

Lindsay had good-naturedly humoured her by agreeing and giving the red head a slight shove saying she would try and remember that in eighty years.

Lindsay remembered, but it was far from the eighty years she predicted.

"Happy belated birthday Cheryl." the brunette smiled softly as her fingers brushed the words engraved on the cold stone. "Sorry I missed your birthday, but the school wouldn't let me leave until spring break."

Hearing something snap behind her, Lindsay's head whirled around to see who it was.

"I thought I saw your car." said the newcomer, hidden in the shadows of the greenery.

Lindsay's lips started to slowly form into a smile and her face began to glow. She recognized that voice...

The owner of the voice came out into the open and Lindsay couldn't help smiling as she saw someone she hadn't seen since the end of winter break and she had to go back to college. It was a tall, dark haired boy with bright blue eyes and a small smile similar to hers moments before.

"Sideswipe!"

Standing up, she ran towards the boy and hugged him. She knew she was hugging a holoform, but she hugged him none the less. It was still Sideswipe after all.

Lindsay continued hugging him for two more minutes before she finally let go.

"What are you doing here?" she asked.

"Like I said, I saw your car. And I remembered what day it was today so I guessed where you were going."

The date was March 7th.

The one year anniversary of Cheryl's death.

"I see..." Lindsay turned away from him and stared back at her friend's grave. "...yeah, I had to visit her today. Sorry I didn't call you first."

Sideswipe shook his head.

"Don't worry about it."

The brunette smiled. She remembered hearing from Mikaela that Ratchet always grumbled about an annoying pair of brothers who he labeled as 'the twins'. According to him, they were terrors who enjoyed pranking, fighting the strongest opponents they came across, and generally driving anyone who dared to get within their vincinity insane.

Sideswipe was one of the aforementioned trouble makers along side his more vain and sociopathic twin brother, Sunstreaker.

The Autobot prankster disguised as a silver Cheverolet Corvette Stingray was a maniacal prankster who sometimes went too far, but was also a good friend. Something that seemed to surprise the others since they really didn't know that much about him other than he was a troublemaker you definitely didn't want to get on the bad side of unless you wanted your life to be hell for the next... whenever Sideswipe decided to relent on making the unfortunate sufferer's life a nightmare.

But it was thanks to him that she managed to get over the pain of losing Cheryl.

"How long do you plan on staying?" Sideswipe asked, grabbing her attention once more.

"Maybe until midnight."

Sideswipe gave her a long, measured look that Lindsay recognized as either disbelief or he didn't believe what she was saying.

"That's it. I'm staying."

"You don't have to." Lindsay looked alarmed.

The look Sideswipe gave her this time showed complete and utter disbelief.

"And leave you alone to face some creepy slagger who stumbles across you and tries to rape you?" he snorted.

Lindsay bristled and her expression darkened.

"Sorry, bad choice of words."

Lindsay didn't say anything, still remaining silent.

Sideswipe rubbed the back of his head and looked away as the awkward silence filled the clearing.

"Look, I'm staying and that's final."

To his relief, a small smile graced her lips.

"Thanks Sideswipe."


	2. Chapter 1

**Okay, just decided to get the prologue out of the way before I decided to start the actual story. Just so you know, the prologue takes place more than a year after the story starts. And yes, Lindsay knows Sideswipe and this is a story detailing before, how and after they meet. And if the prologue doesn't make sense, it will later. Much later. **

**Believe it or not, Lindsay is just an ordinary teenager who goes through life changing experience in this fic. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. Only Lindsay and the other characters you don't recognize in either the books or movies. **

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**Chapter One**

(September 2007)

Lindsay Phoenix crammed in as many binders as her locker would allow her to in irritation. She had been in a bad mood the day before when she came home from school, ignoring her mother's calls of not to slam the door but she did so anyways slamming not only the front door but her bedroom door as well. It didn't deteriorate by the time her mother called her down for dinner and when her younger sister in junior high decided to make some smart comment, Lindsay had snapped and told her to shut the hell up. This earned her a 'finish your dinner and we'll talk about it later' from her mother and as soon as all of the food on her plate was gone, she had stomped up to her room and slammed her door as hard as she could knowing that this would further serve to annoy her mom.

Her mood carried over to the next day and Lindsay was taking out her pent up anger on her books.

Unfortunately, it was getting harder on projecting her anger on the inanimated objects that were used for her education. There seemed to be some sort of commotion going on in the hallway if the group of students crowding around someone or something was anything to go by. Lindsay spotted several people wearing similar jackets and recognized it as the uniform jackets that the Tranquility High football jocks wore.

She wasn't intentionally prejudiced or anything but whenever the jocks were involved with what looked like a fight, it wasn't usually a good sign for the unfortunate person who they set their sights on.

Slamming her locker (she seemed to be doing a lot of slamming lately) and snapping on the lock, Lindsay walked toward the circle of onlookers and shoved her way through. Ignoring the grunts of 'hey!' and dirty looks she got, she finally made it to the middle.

Her suspicions were correct. The jocks were picking a fight.

Standing in the middle and surrounded by the students who had come to see someone getting their face pounded in was a gawky looking boy she recognized as Sam Witwicky.

Lindsay didn't engage in gossip but it was hard not to know about him.

A majority of the student body had been shocked when popular girl Mikaela Banes had dumped equally popular football player Trent Demarco for geeky and awkward Sam Witwicky, who apparently had ran away from a cop on his mother's bicycle. His mother's _pink _and_ girly_ bicycle.

The story had greatly amused Lindsay and her opinion of Mikaela sky rocketed. She knew that working against the popular crowd pretty much made your high school life miserable but Mikaela chose to foresake what made her the envy of a lot of the girls and left Trent for Sam. What resulted was Mikaela's drop from the top of the social hiearchy and Sam the target of Trent and his jock friends.

And now Trent had cornered Sam and the expression on his face seemed to say that he was going to savour each beating he gave the other boy.

Not if _she _had anything to say about it.

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Sam gulped, his eyes moving side to side as he tried to find an opening in the circle of people. Unfortunately, he knew that he would only be pushed back into the middle to face Trent.

Gulping again, Sam watched Trent pounding his fist and grinning as he did so. The first day back at school, the football player had come up to him and threatened him. Mikaela had been there at the time and it was because of her that he backed off while shooting venemous glares in Sam's direction that said it wasn't over.

When Trent came back to verify his threat, he brought his friends along.

Great.

"Any last words, Witwinkle?" Trent snarled.

Numerous words rolled into Sam's head as he did have a lot of things to say to the jock. But while his mind was working on over drive, his mouth just opened and clamped shut on him.

Last summer he had faced off against a transforming robot alien hell intent on getting the Allspark, an alien artifact shaped like a cube that could create new life in anything electronic. With Megatron out for his blood, Sam did everything in his power to keep the cube away from him. He knew that if the Decepticon leader got his hands on the Allspark, Earth and the rest of the universe would have been doomed. And even though he had saved the world, doing what practically every hero worshipping fan would have killed to do, he was still scared of the star football player of Tranquility high.

"Um... uh... not really." Sam stammered as he started backing away.

Trent's fist flew towards his face and Sam ducked, falling onto his knees before quickly scrambling away from his attacker.

He stood up, some what breathless as he watched Trent turn towards him again, growling.

Sam's mind had blanked when he saw the other boy attacking him, but he still managed to avoid the oncoming fist. He vaguely wondered if his increased instincts had anything to do with the 'running for his life from Megatron' regime he had been forced to take in Mission city. It definitely involved a lot of ducking since he had to avoid having his head smashed in my flying debris. And he knew that before Mission city, Trent would have smashed his face in then when he first threw that punch.

Trent threw another punch and Sam ducked again; this time not falling on his knees as he got as far away from the jock as he could.

Sam could hear the whispers of the other students but he ignored them as he concentrated on Trent. He knew he wasn't getting any where by just ducking and avoiding the blows thrown at him but facing off against a murderous robot that was close to thirty feet tall was a lot different than going up against a jock closer to his height. With the robot, you tried to avoid his blows instead of fighting back with everything you had. And the only way he could think of to get Trent to back off was if he beat him up to the point he couldn't fight any more.

He snorted. Yeah right, like that was going to happen.

"Stay still!" Trent ground out when Sam avoided his fist for the fourth time.

Sam would have laughed at his opponent's frustration if he wasn't being hustled closer by the anxious crowd. Several students were rooting for him while others urged Trent to continue. A majority of them just kept silent and watched.

"Yeah... I would... but then you'd punch me so... no." Sam felt his throat go dry at those words. Crap. Why couldn't his lips just keep shut?

"You're dead Wetwicky!"

"It's Witwicky, actually." Sam automatically corrected him before wincing.

Before he could move out of the way again, he felt someone grab the back of his shirt and jerk him backwards. Sam tried to pull away but whoever grabbed him was keeping a firm grip. There were several guffaws and Sam assumed that whoever had a hold on him had to be one of Trent's friends.

Trent was now advancing on him, smirk on his face.

Closing his eyes Sam prayed to God, Buddha, Mohammed, Primus and whatever other deity existed in the universe that his beating would be over with that he wouldn't be in too much pain.

But whatever he expected didn't come. He heard a swoosh which was followed by a grunt and then something falling onto the ground with a thud.

Sam opened one eye to see if Trent was going to punch him to find the athlete's back turned towards his head. He was rubbing the back of his head and facing someone else.

"Mind your own freaking business, Phoenix!" Trent growled at the person.

"What, so you can send people into traction?" the person replied.

Sam blinked. The person who was standing up to Trent and saving his hide was a girl?

"What goes on between Wetwinky and me has nothing to do with you!"

"Like hell. You're attempting to beat him up in the hallway you stupid idiot." she paused. "And it's Witwicky dumbass."

Feeling the grip on his shirt loosen a bit, Sam tugged away hard to try and get a better look at his saviour. The person was a girl with light brown hair and blue eyes, her gaze currently burning a hole into Trent.

"So what?" Trent's expression was openly ugly and his mouth was twisted into a snarl.

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"Mikaela probably dumped you because she realized how much of a testosterone fueled jerk you were. Have you realized that or is it too much to get through to that thick head of yours?" Lindsay said, standing her ground and glaring back at Trent. Through the grape vine, she heard the jock call his former girl friend a 'bunny'.

Sam Witwicky seemed to be doing fine on his own until one of his goons had grabbed him and forced him to stay in place. She hadn't planned on interfering but when Carter Lukes snatched Sam by his shirt, she threw the textbook she had accidentally brought to the fight at the back of Trent's head to distract him.

Trent Demarco was used to getting his way through intimidation. Sure, he was taller and more muscular than her but Lindsay knew that one well aimed punch in the gut would do him in.

But before a fight could break out, the school bell rang shrilly.

Everyone who was watching the fight seemed to snap out of a daze as they started heading towards their classes. Trent remained a bit longer, throwing nasty glances at Lindsay and then Sam before stomping off with his entourage.

Lindsay's glare remained even when Trent turned away from her in disgust with his friends throwing dirty looks at either her or Sam, but mostly her.

Sighing, she turned towards Trent's to be victim.

"You okay?" she asked.

He seemed shaky, but other wise fine. "Y-yeah. Thanks for that back there. Not a lot of people can stand up to Trent."

"I know."

Sam stared at her, squinting his eyes as if he'd seen her before. Not surprising since they went to the same school and were in the same grade; in fact, they had been in the same history class the year before.

"Wait, Phoenix?" He said, stating her last name.

Lindsay knew what was coming and sighed, folding her arms across her chest as she waited. "Yes?"

"Phoenix... as in you're related to Chief of Police Phoenix?"

"Yes." Lindsay smiled. "I'm related to him. He's my dad."

Sam looked horrified which confused her. As far as she knew, Sam was one of the good kids who didn't drink, race down the roads at three digit miles per kilometer and he didn't do drugs-

-oh.

"You're the one who did Mojo, right?"

"They were pain killers!" Sam threw his hands up into the air. "They were my dog's pain killers and the only reason it said Mojo on the bottle is because that's my dog's name! I'm not a crack head!"

The brunette covered her mouth with her hand, trying not to laugh out loud. "Is that why you rode your mother's bicycle trying to get away from a cop?"

Sam spluttered, wanting to say something but having no idea what to say.

"C'mon! I mean-" he stopped when he saw Lindsay waving away his words.

"It's fine. Like you said before, you obviously don't get high. And anyways, my dad doesn't know who the rogue cop who chased you was. It was definitely not any of the Tranquility cops. And definitely not Officer Jackson."

"Officer Jackson?"

"He was the officer who interrogated and accused you of doing 'Mojo'."

"Oh."

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**This has actually got to be the longest chapter I've ever written. And it took me a day and a half, yay! **

**Okay, I hope that I didn't make Sam seem too wimpy or anything. I added the dodging and running away from Trent as a last addition since he did a lot of that in the first movie. But while Trent is less intimidating than Megatron, I still can't picture Sam going up to him and trying to beat him into submission, hence the dodge and get away thing. **

**And how was my portrayal of Trent? I didn't want him to seem like the stereotypical jock but I also wanted to dabble in it a little too. As for his getting Sam's name wrong, he does it on purpose. **

**Just so you know, this isn't going to be my only new story. I'm going to be working on a 'Transformer fan suddenly find themselves in Transformer universe' because it seems like fun. I'm going to add in a few twists though, so hopefully you'll be surprised. **


	3. Chapter 2

**Hmm... I know how I'm going to end this story but how many chapters it will take is something else entirely. Which is a good thing since I have yet to think up an ending for my other stories. Just don't expect the other chapters to be as long as the last one since I can never seem to write more than either four or five chapters for a fic. **

**To answer a few questions... **

**No, this isn't going to be a SideswipexOc fic, it will however be a friendship one. **

**And this chapter, you all get to see Trent's not so chivalrous side. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers, only Lindsay and the other characters you don't recognize. **

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**Chapter 2**

Lindsay had barely gotten to her desk when the final bell rang. The teacher wasn't in the room yet so the brunette brought out her notebook and pencil case, ready to take notes when the teacher entered the room. Feeling something poke her hard in the shoulder, she whirled around to come face to face with the asian girl who sat behind her, Rae Kim.

"Yes?" Lindsay asked, raising an eyebrow and rubbing her shoulder.

"Did you actually throw a textbook at Trent?"

It figured that the news would get around fast. "How do you know?"

Lindsay knew that Rae didn't engage herself in fights, whether it be making herself a target or being part of an audience of onlookers.

Rae rolled her eyes. "That's what everyone was talking about when they came into class."

And by that Rae must have meant the school gossips. Of course they would be talking; Police chief's daughter facing off against football star and most popular boy in school, Trent Demarco.

"I'm guessing that I'm not very popular with the social hiearchy's elite." Lindsay said flatly, rolling her own eyes.

In reply, Rae jerked her head towards the left, where the windows were. The popular group were the ones who occupied the seats closest to the windows, middle and back.

Lindsay glanced in the direction her classmate pointed out and saw that most of the girls were whispering and staring at her. When they saw her staring back at them, the whispers increased and some of them glared. Turning her back on them, she faced the Korean girl again.

"Do I even want to know what they're saying about me?"

Her classmate shrugged. "It's not that bad. I mean, we've heard them say worse things before, like about Mikaela Banes."

"So they're saying bad things about me but they aren't calling me a skank, is that it?"

Rae shrugged again and Lindsay was forced to cut her conversation short as the teacher came into the room and started the lesson.

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By the time lunch rolled around, Lindsay's wrist was sore. The teacher's notes had been practically endless and she could have sworn she nearly tore several holes into the paper as she wrote.

"Ow." she groaned, shaking her wrist as she tried to make the pain go away.

Suddenly, she felt herself being shoved hard forward. Her instincts kicked in and she grabbed the unfortunate person infront of her by the backpack, bringing them both down. As she pushed herself up, she saw the person she accidentally pulled down with her glaring.

"Sorry." she said, wincing. Grabbing the guy hadn't been neccessary, but she blamed her instinct to prevent herself from falling on that.

Hearing laughter the chief of police's daughter knew instantly that her falling down had been no accident. As she stood up, she folded her arms across her chest and faced Trent who was smirking at her.

"That was payback for this morning." he sneered.

"For what? For preventing the salvage of whatever pride you had?" Lindsay snapped.

Aware of the students who stopped to stare at what was going to be the second fight of the day, the two involved ignored them as they glared daggers into the other.

Lindsay should have been scared; a fact that she was well aware of was that the jocks, especially Trent, usually got their way through intimidation. But having two older brothers who liked to rough house as well as a father who encouraged her to take Karate, she didn't particularly mind going up against someone who had advantages through height and muscle.

She proved that in grade two when she pummeled the school bully for making her best friend cry when he pushed her into a wet mud puddle. And he was in grade four too.

There was a clang and Lindsay found herself unable to breathe. While she'd been distracted by her thoughts, the football player had moved forward and slammed her against the lockers. Lindsay wondered how he managed to do this in a hallway full of students until she saw that a circle similar to the one earlier had formed around them. This time though, Lindsay was the one Trent was after.

_Thanks a lot, _Lindsay scowled as she tried to glare at the people who made it possible for Trent to pin her against the metal lockers.

Knowing she wasn't going to be able to force Trent's hands away from her throat, she attempted to kick him. Doing this rubbed the jock's hands against her throat, irritating it, but she didn't care at the moment. The only thing she was focused on was getting him to let go.

"TRENT, LET HER GO!" a furious voice ripped through the hallway.

The circle of students parted like the red sea and a brunette with darker hair than Lindsay's stormed towards the middle of the circle. Her blue eyes flashed angrily as she glared at Trent.

Lindsay fell onto the ground hard as Trent released her, running a hand through his blond hair.

"Hey 'Kaela, didn't expect to see you here." he flashed her a grin.

The dark haired brunette didn't return the sentiment as she placed her hands on her hips and glared at him even more.

'Trent, I thought I told you that it was over." her voice was calm, but anyone could hear the restrained anger in it.

"C'mon 'Kaela, don't be like that. Didn't you miss me?" his voice was playful, almost as if he hadn't been squeezing the air out of the girl by his feet seconds before.

"No," 'Kaela, who was formally known as Mikaela sounded tired when she spoke. "No Trent, I didn't miss you."

There was silence as the crowd registered the words of Trent's ex-girlfriend. Then whispers broke out as they waited for what would happen next.

Trent's fists clenched and his face started turning red with anger. He looked like he was about to punch her, but he opened his mouth instead.

"Fine. I'm glad to be rid of you, slut!"

Mikaela's expression was one of stunned belief but she regained her composure as her own fists clenched and she looked her former boyfriend straight in the eye.

"Oh, that's real nice." she snorted. "Just because you think you're god's greatest gift to women, anyone who has the sense to dump you is less than trash."

"Considering how inflated his ego is, that's not very surprising." Lindsay coughed, trying to hide her laughter. She had recovered from Trent's hold and was standing, ready to fight him again if he started.

"What's going on here?" a new voice interrupted, making Lindsay groan. She knew that voice any where...

The crowd of students parted way again and into the middle of the circle walked the school's least favorite vice-principal, Mr Maxwell. He was an average sized man with a notable stomach and a receding hairline.

His eyes landed on Mikaela, Trent and then Lindsay.

"Banes, Demarco, and Phoenix... come with me."

With great reluctance, the three seniors followed the vice principal as they headed towards the office.

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"The beginning of the school year and you three decide to start a fight?" Mr Maxwell, or Maxwell as most of the students addressed him as, snarled.

Trent rolled his eyes and scoffed while both Lindsay and Mikaela kept quiet, though the former had a look of extreme distaste on her face. She didn't like Maxwell that much since the man himself hated practically all the kids at the school except the ones who got good grades and were perfect little angels. Considering how Lindsay had a habit of putting people in their place through physically violent means, she was definitely not one of them.

On the bright side, she knew that Trent wasn't going to get any special treatment either. For some reason, Maxwell hated jocks. He disliked them so much that it extended to their girlfriends; though in Mikaela's case, it was _former_ girlfriend. Lindsay chalked it up to him being picked on by the jocks of his school year.

"Do you have anything to say for yourselves?"

"Yeah." Trent was grinning; not a good sign of they wanted to leave without detention. "Did you go sign up for those anger therapy classes I told you about?"

Lindsay clapped a hand over her mouth, trying hard not to laugh. Mikaela threw her a look, daring her not to. Maxwell would put all of them in detention otherwise.

The vice principal spluttered, his face turning red and then purple. When he seemed to be able to form words again, his eyes were wide and wild looking that two of the three unfortunate students who dared to incur his wrath were worried that he was going to have a heart attack or stroke.

"Detention!" he barked at all three of them. "You will all be serving detention for a week! Now get out!"

"This is all your fault Trent," Lindsay grumbled as they finally left the classroom. The jock ignored her as he walked, thankfully, in the opposite direction of where she had to go. It was now five o'clock and the brunette had finished half of her homework in detention. "Geez... two hours?"

"Yeah, a little much isn't it?" someone said from next to her.

Lindsay knew who it was but out of good manners, she turned to face the person walking beside her. It was Mikaela Banes, the former queen of the popular crowd.

"True, but I've gotten used to it. Is this the first time you've been in detention?"

"Yes," the way Mikaela eyed her suggested that she thought Lindsay was going to make fun of her.

"Well, you're lucky. My mom's going to be on my case again for getting a detention on the first month of school."

"You know, for being the daughter of a policeman you seem to get into trouble a lot."

"If you have two mischievous brothers and a dad who encourages you to defend yourself, that's what typically happens."

"Are you serious?" Mikaela gave her an incredulous look.

"Yes."

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**And this is where I decide to end it. Over four pages but barely at the bottom of five. This is because of two things: the first is that I'm freaking lazy and the second is that because I also think this is a good place to end it too. **

**So yeah, Trent returns and this time he catches Lindsay off guard even though it's her fault this time. So when will Cheryl, Sideswipe and the other Autobots come in? Soon, very soon, just right now. I don't want to rush the story. **

**Another thing: yeah, Trent dared to shove Lindsay into a locker for going the whole men have to treat women nicely. I imagined Trent to be hardly of the chivalrous type, but I don't think he'd go as far as to punch a girl. Push her around a bit, but hardly hit her. And let's just say that Lindsay is far from helpless. Which she's proven over the years. **


	4. Chapter 3

**I can't believe it, for once in my life I am continuously updating. At the same time I am writing this, I am also working on another of my incomplete works. So sorry if doesn't come as fast as the other updates, which I believe were just one day apart. Just so you know at the time, my creative juice was flowing. That's why the updates were pretty fast. **

**You get to find out why Lindsay was in such a bad mood in the first chapter. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. I do, however, own Lindsay and the Cheryl. **

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**Chapter 3**

Over their week of detention, Lindsay and Mikaela got to know each other well. The light haired brunette still missed her best friend, but just because Cheryl decided to ignore her didn't mean that Lindsay had to wait around when her best friend decided to acknowledge her again. If Cheryl could make and hang out with new friends, so could she.

Several days ago, she had finally decided to confront Cheryl about her new boyfriend, Dylan Travis. He was a high school drop out two years above them and apparently, when Lindsay had been forced to go visit her great aunt Eunice, they had hooked up. It was to Lindsay's extreme distaste that when she returned, she found her friend hanging all over a greasy, dark haired guy who smelled like cigarettes... and something else that Lindsay couldn't identify but was certain was illegal.

Lindsay couldn't stand him, but she tolerated Dylan for Cheryl's sake. Barely.

Then one day, when Cheryl had knocked on her door Sunday morning at four o'clock, that had been the last straw. Lindsay immediately suspected that Dylan had a hand in the girl's intoxication; she had never seen Cheryl touch a drop of alcohol before.

Dylan was bad news and worse, Cheryl's early morning visit had woken up her parents. After having made sure that the red head wouldn't be suffering from alcohol poisoning and putting her to bed, Lindsay's dad had interrogated her for about an hour as to why her best friend had showed up completely wasted. Finally, Lindsay had said that maybe there had been a house party serving alcohol. Then her dad asked her if she was aware of such a thing; Lindsay dryly replied that she only heard about them through the grape vine because none of her peers in their right mind would dare to tell the police chief's daughter when and where underaged minors were being served booze.

In return, Chief Phoenix gave his daughter a flat look before he finally allowed her to go to bed.

When her friend was finally sober and hangover free, Lindsay took Cheryl out of the house where they had a long talk.

To make a long story short, it hadn't gone over well with either of them: Cheryl angry that Lindsay had the gall to talk bad about her boyfriend and Lindsay angry that Cheryl didn't realize that dating Dylan wasn't such a good idea.

It ended when the two girls turned their backs on each other and stormed away, fuming. Since then, neither of them tried to talk to each other.

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"Hey, Sam." Mikaela greeted her boyfriend with a kiss.

It was Friday afternoon and the two girls had finally been released from their detention. At lunch, when Lindsay accidentally bumped into the couple, her detention partner invited Lindsay to come with her and Sam to Coffee Works afterschool when they were done detention. The way Mikaela jabbed Sam in the side with her elbow made Lindsay certain that the dark haired brunette came up with the idea on a whim because two seconds later, Sam was breathlessly nodding.

"H-hey 'Kaela," he stammered, his face turning bright red.

Averting her eyes from the couple, she focused her attention on the blond haired boy standing next to Sam. He and Sam had been talking up to the point that she and Mikaela arrived from the designated meeting spot.

The boy was very, very handsome. And judging by his appearance he was about a year or two older than them. Estimating his height to be around 5'10 he had platinum blond hair with bright piercing blue eyes. He was muscular, but it was the kind that of muscular that you got from working all day, not working out at the gym.

Lindsay hated to admit it, but he was a total eye candy.

Feeling her face burn, the brunette looked away for several minutes before she was certain that the redness in her face had died down.

"Aren't you coming?" Mikaela asked, gesturing towards the backseats.

The girl nodded, quickly opening the yellow and blackstriped camaro's back door and going inside. She was so anxious to avoid the blond that she smacked her head against the edge of the car's roof.

"Are you okay?" The blond haired boy asked, a smile playing on his lips that had Lindsay glaring at him.

"Yes." she nodded before stepping inside and making herself comfortable on the leather seats, strapping herself in. She made sure she didn't hit her head again.

"So how was detention?" Sam asked, trying to break the awkward silence that filled the car five minutes later.

"The usual." Mikaela replied from Lindsay's right.

There was more silence as Lindsay decided to throw in her own question. "So, Sam..."

"Yeah?"

The light haired brunette's brow creased as she tried to figure out how to phrase her question. Finally, she said: "Who's the guy driving your camaro?"

"Huh?" Sam's head swiveled to face her while the blond haired boy snickered, but kept his eyes on the road. "H-he's my...uh...cousin! My cousin Brent...from...uh... Palm Springs! He's visiting and he said he wanted to try driving my car!"

Lindsay gave Sam a flat stare. "Okay..." she paused. "His name rhymes with 'Trent'."

"Ha ha ha... yeah. I just realized that."

"Why do you ask?" Mikaela asked, raising an eyebrow. There was an amused smile on her face and the tone in the girl's voice suggested that she knew Lindsay had an instant crush on Sam's cousin.

Lindsay glared at her. "Because I haven't seen him before," she said through gritted teeth. "And it's natural for me to ask, nothing else."

"Right..." Mikaela said, her voice disbelieving.

Sitting against the soft leather seat, Lindsay pinched the bridge of her nose. "You know, if Brent had been seen in Tranquility before I definitely would have heard about it."

* * *

Mikaela couldn't help smirking at her new friend's statement. She knew perfectly well what Lindsay meant by that statement.

In his new human holoform guise Bumblebee was a complete and utter hottie, there was no denying it. Not that she told Sam since she had a feeling he wouldn't be too happy about it. Had 'Brent' been spotted anywhere in their town, Mikaela was certain that gossip about him not only would have spread through the female student population but to some of the young women as well.

Speaking of friends, Lindsay had been the first one she had made in weeks after losing all her other ones.

After the whole recovering the Allspark and saving the world from the evil Decepticons, Mikaela had dumped Trent. Over the summer, she had gotten phone calls from her now ex-friends about her terrible mistake. When she had told them about how much of a sexist jerk (she still remembered his bunny comment and how he wouldn't let her try and fix his car) Trent was, they had gotten pretty catty and told her that she could forget about sitting at their table when school started.

Which was fine. Mikaela surprisingly no longer cared about what they thought. Her time with Sam and the Autobots taught her that appearances weren't everything. And truthfully, it was a lesson she was glad to have learned. Though her social status was practically non-existent, she didn't pay much attention to it. Looking back, she couldn't believe how shallow and superficial her view on life had been.

She really was glad to have met Sam.

They soon reached the coffee shop and after finding a parking store, they went inside. After getting their orders (Mikaela wanted a coffee with whipcream, Sam an iced coffee while Brent didn't want anything), Lindsay went to stand in line.

"Okay, Bee..." Sam said, once she had left. "You know the drill, no mentioning giant robots or anything related to it. People are still talking about the Mission City incident." His eyes were focused on Lindsay's back, making sure that she wasn't close enough to hear him and that she wasn't coming back yet.

"Sam," Bumblebee sounded amused. "I know."

"Calm down, Sam." Mikaela gripped her boyfriend's hand from across the table, squeezing it tightly. "Bee knows not to mention anything about... you know..."

"This is the Police Chief's daughter!" Sam was still keeping an eye on the girl. "She's not stupid and she can tell when something's up! I don't think she actually believed my story about Bee being from Palm Springs!"

"But he isn't from Palm Springs." Mikaela pointed out.

"I know that and you know that but she doesn't!"

"Sam." his girlfriend gave him a stern look. "Calm down. She's not going to find out. As long as you don't... panic, we'll be fine."

They didn't say anything more when Lindsay came back with their orders along with a caramel macchiato and apple crumble. She handed Mikaela her coffee with whipped cream, Sam his iced coffee, and placed her caramel macchiato and apple crumble dessert in front of her. Staring at the empty space in front of Sam's cousin, she frowned.

"Are you sure you don't want anything?"

Brent merely nodded and Lindsay left it at that.

"Okay, just say something if you do."

* * *

Lindsay didn't admit it, but Sam and Mikaela were pretty fun to hang around with. She wasn't sure about Brent but that was because he didn't really say much; he only talked when he was asked a direct question. She would have included him more, but Lindsay could tell that the blond was content with the arrangement of only her, Mikaela and Sam doing the talking.

Unfortunately, a certain someone's presence had to pretty much put a damper on things.

"If it ain't Chief Phoenix's daughter." a voice sneered from next to the table.

Sam and Mikaela stopped talking as Lindsay turned to glare at the intruder. Brent wisely chose to remain silent.

"Hi Dylan." Lindsay muttered.

"Is that how you treat your best friend's boyfriend?"

"No." she growled. "I just hate you."

"How sweet of you."

Fingers clenching onto the table top with her nails scratching the surface Lindsay said coldly, "Is there any reason why you came up to talk to me or are you just here to be annoying?"

"Naw," he sneered. "I just saw you and thought I'd drop by to say hello."

_Fuck you, _Lindsay was tempted to scream that at him but she just clenched her teeth together while glaring.

"By the way, I haven't seen you or Cheryl talk to each other for a few days. Something happen?"

_You came into the picture. _"As far as I'm concerned, it's none of your business."

"Look." Mikaela stood up, putting her hands on her hips. "I don't know what's going on, but if you came here just to be rude and obnoxious, why don't you leave?"

Dylan stared blankly at her. "Say... aren't you Trent's former bunny slut?"

There was silence as Mikaela stared at him, stunned. She blinked several times before shoving past Dylan and going to what was presumably the washroom.

Lindsay snarled, slapping him across the face before she walked after Mikaela.


	5. Chapter 4

**So how did you like the last part? Poor Mikaela. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Transformers. Only Lindsay and Cheryl. **

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* * *

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**Chapter 4**

It was Sunday afternoon, nearly a month after that faithful gathering with Mikaela. If Cheryl and her had been on speaking terms, they would have been doing something by now. Instead, Lindsay was wandering around town with nothing to do. The light haired brunette was beginning to wonder if they were going to talk again. It was already weeks since the two friends fought and still they were mad at each other. She had been willing to give Dylan another chance (even though he didn't deserve it) just so that she could talk to her friend again. But after he called Mikaela a slut, she would rather drink gasoline and be lit ablaze.

As much as Lindsay wanted to march up to Cheryl's front door and tell her about how much Dylan was an asshole, she refrained from doing so. After how it went last time, her friend would accuse her of making it up just so she'd dump Dylan. And then they'd be even more pissed off at each other.

Gah, why was Cheryl so freaking stubborn? Why couldn't she see Dylan as a creep like everyone else did? Did she actually consider him as one of those 'misunderstood guys'?

Her parents were starting to get suspicious, as she recalled the conversation she had with her mom this morning.

* * *

"Lindsay, did you and Cheryl have a fight?" Madeleine Phoenix asked her daughter.

Looking up from her eggs, Lindsay glowered at her mother before resuming eating her breakfast. She gobbled up the rest of her eggs and finished off the two pieces of bacon on her plate before replying to the question. "How did you know?"

"Because she hasn't come over at all. And there haven't been any calls either."

"Yeah." Lindsay muttered.

"Was it about what happened last month?"

The brunette didn't answer her mother. It wasn't that she didn't trust her mother to keep secrets, it was just that Madeleine wasn't very good at hiding them for long. And before Lindsay knew it, her dad knew the entire story. Which was something that gave her grief at school because being a cop's daughter, especially the chief's, did not make you popular. At all.

Like it was her fault they decided to take drugs and drink alcohol and get caught in the process.

It had been a little over a month since Cheryl came over to her house drunk. Her mother had been the one to make sure that her friend wasn't going to die from alcohol poisoning before making sure that the passed out girl was going to be comfortable before the hang over hit. Madeleine was a nurse, so she knew how to deal with someone who indulged a little too much in their drinks.

"Yes." She said, deciding to tell part of the truth.

"I see..." Madeleine raised an eyebrow. She knew better than to ask her oldest daughter and third child something that delved into more personal matters. Even though she didn't like it, Lindsay would lie and say no more about a topic she chose to keep to herself. Despite the lectures she got from her father or the threats of groundings and actually being grounded, the teenager refused to change her ways of keeping her silence. And when Madeleine confronted her about it, Lindsay had a grave but stubborn expression on her face. She said that her mother could continue asking and receive lies in return or maintain her silence so that she wouldn't have to lie and cover it up in the first place.

The girl had been promptly grounded and her mother had walked off in tears. It was hard, but Madeleine had chosen to accept her daughter's words in the end.

Finished with her breakfast, Lindsay quickly washed her dishes and put them on the drying rack. But before could leave the room, her mom spoke.

"Lindsay... if it gets really bad," Her voice slightly wavered. "Will you please talk to either me or your father?"

* * *

After _those _words from her mom, Lindsay started feeling like crap. Again. She seemed to be feeling like crap a lot lately. Maybe it had to do with the fact that she didn't like confiding to her own parents. Like normal kids did.

With a frustrated sigh, she leaned back only to remember that she was sitting at the edge of the mall's fountain.

The brunette's scream of surprise could be heard in a good part of the mall.

She fell backwards into the fountain with a splash and if it wasn't bad enough that she was being soaked from behind, the water falling from the top of the fountain wasn't helping either. She blinked several times in stunned silence before she moved towards the edge on all fours. She looked up and saw that everyone was staring at her. As much as the girl would have liked to snap at them to mind their own _freaking _business, she knew it would only add fuel to the fire of gossip on the chief's daughter.

So with a huff, she crossed her arms on the fountain's rim and placed her head in them. God, she just didn't care any more...

"I hate this day so much," Lindsay muttered. "Fuck. I hate this entire _week._"

It had been a particularly bad week for her, but Lindsay hadn't admit that to her new friends or family.

The brunette had no idea how long she stayed in the fountain. She could hear the whispers around her, but chose to ignore them. People were gossiping about one thing or another... Lindsay had frankly put up with it too long to bother getting mad any more.

"Do people usually sit _in _the fountains?" An amused voice asked.

"No dumbass!" Lindsay snapped, glaring vehemently at the idiot who asked her. "I've just had a fucked up day so if you don't mind, I'd appreicate it if you would piss off!"

"Lindsay?"

She recognized the second voice (not the one who asked her the first question) that spoke to her. With a groan, she shifted her head slightly to face the person.

"Hi Mikaela," She sighed. To her displeasure, she was with Sam and Brent. Not that she hated them or anything, but she did not want more people witnessing her sitting in a fountain, completely frustrated to the point of crying.

"What are you doing?" The girl asked.

"Cooling off," Lindsay muttered.

"In the fountain?" Sam added his two cents incredulously.

"Best place to cool off."

"Okay..." Sam stared at her.

"Now if you don't mind, I'd like to be left alone to silently suffer in humiliation."

With that said, Lindsay went back to burying her head in her arms.

"Well that isn't any good." It was the first voice.

Next thing she knew, Lindsay was being lifted up and thrown over someone's shoulder. She was speechless for several seconds before she finally found the right words to say in the situation she had been placed in.

"What the hell?" She screeched. "Put me down!"

"Don't think so." Said the person holding her.

Lindsay growled, glaring at the person who lifted her out. Unfortunately, she was facing the back of his head so it wasn't going to be very easy for her to slap them. However...

"Hey!" He yelped.

The girl smiled, proud of herself for coming up with the idea to knee him. She guessed that she hit him between the abdomen and chest. So she did it again. And again. After a good thirty seconds or so, she was roughly pulled backwards into a pair of arms.

Suddenly, she was staring at a pair of blue eyes that seemed vaguely familiar to her. Before she could recall where she'd seen them before, the annoyed owner spoke. "Stop it."

The boy holding her had black hair and as mentioned before, blue eyes. He was attractive looking and seemed to be drawing attention, though the cause of that might have been the fact that he was holding Lindsay bridal style.

Lindsay stared flatly at him before drawing her left hand back and slamming her palm against his chin.

"OW! Will you knock it off?"

* * *

Sam watched the scene in dumbfounded fascination while next to him, Mikaela did the same. 'Brent', however, seemed amused by the public display.

"Anyone else here feel embarrassed?" Sam asked no one in particular. He could feel his cheeks grow hot as he watched one of the new Autobots, Sideswipe, argue with a classmate in the middle of the mall as if they were the only ones there. They didn't seem to notice the other shoppers stopping to stare as they continued bickering. Unfortunately, Sam wasn't so lucky to be ignorant of the stares they were receiving.

"I do," Mikaela said from beside him. She snorted at something Lindsay said.

Bumblebee merely snickered.

Sam elbowed him.

"Not funny Bee!" he murmured. Though he was glad his girlfriend was in better spirits.

Ever since her encounter with the bastard at Coffee Works, she hadn't been quite herself for about a week. Whenever anyone asked if she was okay, she would reply with an 'I'm fine' and say no more. Even before he came up to them, Sam had a strong dislike for Dylan McClain. He hadn't been part of the popular crowd, but he enjoyed pushing other students around none the less. He was a year above Sam. Thankfully though, he dropped out in his junior year.

There was a loud smack and this time all three of them stared dumbfoundedly as Lindsay slapped Sideswipe.

* * *

What in Primus was the femme's problem, Sideswipe wanted to know as he dodged another one of the girl's swipes. Shouldn't she have been a little more grateful that he had pulled her out of the fountain, or did she actually want to stay there?

While staying at a temporary base as the human government tried to find a permanent location that the Transformers could call home, the silver mech had overheard the two human adolescents talk about going to a mall. Looking up the definition on the World wide web, he discovered it was a big building that housed smaller stores selling merchandise that ranged from clothes to food. It was also a place where human teenagers hung out to have fun.

Having virtually nothing to do ever since he landed on Earth, Sideswipe asked if he could come along with them. Mikaela and Sam were surprised with the request, but they said yes. So he went along with them, the teenagers being driven by Bee and Sideswipe putting up his holoform so it didn't look like his vehicle form was being driven by an invisible man. On Earth, the locals didn't take too well to cars that seemingly drove themselves.

"Everything alright here?" A mall cop asked as he came up to them.

The girl in his arms stopped struggling and gave the man a flat look. "Everything's fine."

The cop looked incredulous. "Er... right."

Feeling everyone's stares, the man cleared his throat to try and make himself look professional.

"I'm sorry to say that you're causing a disturbance..."

The girl sighed loudly, interrupting the cop as she rolled her eyes.

"Put me down." She told Sideswipe, sounding tired.

He complied to her wishes, setting her down. She didn't seem to be in too much of a hurry to leave, as she clenched her brown hair with both hands and wrung the water out of it onto the floor. She did the same thing with her knee length jeans skirt.

Finally, she looked up at the cop.

"I'll leave." She used her hand to indicate towards them. "They didn't do anything so don't kick them out."

Then she left, walking towards the mall doors with water still dripping from her clothes.

The black haired holoform stared after her blankly. He didn't know why, but something about her seemed off. Maybe it was because he found her in the fountain, not caring about anything in particular.

No... that wasn't it. She seemed upset about something.

"I'll catch up with you guys later." He said, coming to a quick decision.

Sideswipe knew that if he didn't go after her, the image of the girl sitting forlornly in the water would remain in his circuits for an orn. Or longer.

* * *

**An orn would calculate to about two weeks. **


End file.
